Adobe, Avid and FCP X: Resources for Switching

If you currently use Final Cut Studio you're going to have to switch to something different at some point. That might mean "upgrading" to FCP X, or moving to a competitor's product, like Adobe Premiere Pro or Avid Media Composer. To aid this, I've included links to demo versions and free/paid tutorials.

Demo Software
Final Cut Pro X Demo download link: No demo version available. A 30-day demo version is now available here. Cost of full application: $299, plus $49 for Compressor and $49 for Motion.

Adobe Creative Suite 5.5: Production Premium Demo download link:Adobe CS 5.5 Production Premium 30-day Trial Version Includes Premiere Pro, Photoshop, After Effects, Encore, Audition, Illustrator, On Location and more. Cost of full application: 50% off ($849.50) thanks to a limited time "switch" promotion! Regularly $1650 for the suite of applications; $440 for the same suite in its "student/teacher" edition. (PremierePro can also be bought separately, but this is not nearly the same value as the bundle, which includes After Effects, Audition, Encore, etc.)

Avid Media Composer Demo download link:Avid Media Composer 5 Free 30-day Trial Cost of full application: $995 thanks to a limited time "switch" promotion. Regularly $2295; $295 for educational edition.

Lightworks Finally, it should be noted that Lightworks -- a professional editing application used to cut such films as Pulp Fiction, The Departed, and The King's Speech -- has gone open source for Windows and is slated for a late-2011 release on the Mac. If you currently have a dual-boot Mac, this is definitely a no-risk option to consider.

 

Tutorials
Final Cut Pro X

IzzyVideo: Final Cut Pro X Tutorial Cost: Free! Notes: Over 2.5 hours of training videos, plus project files. I don't expect this to go into a ton of detail, but what I've watched so far seems pretty good, and you can't beat the price.

Ripple Training: FCP X Cost: $40 Notes: I've used Ripple Training tutorials for earlier editions of Final Cut Pro, and I find them very efficient ways of getting up to speed on the application. These download to your iPad or computer through the iTunes store.

Larry Jordan: FCP X Cost: $99 for the entire set of tutorials. Or chapters for $15 each. Notes: Larry Jordan's previous FCP tutorials have been very good, but I can't say whether these are worth the extra cost over the Ripple tutorials. Jordan's tutorials have a little more personality than Ripple's, which is a pro or con depending on your taste.

 

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Adobe Premiere Pro

Adobe: Editing With Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 If You're an Final Cut Pro user Cost: Free! Notes: A PDF that lays it all out -- straight from Adobe. Clearly they are in it to win it.

Adobe: Switching to Adobe Premiere Pro 5 Cost: Free! Notes: Covers same info as above, but in video form. About 80 minutes of tutorials to help you make the switch from FCP to Premiere Pro. Probably not enough to train you completely, but enough to let you reassure you that switching to Adobe would be a simple transition.

Adobe: Adobe TV - Learn Premiere Pro CS5 Cost: Free! Notes: Excerpts from the Lynda.com training listed below. Probably not a solution for advanced training.

Adobe: Learn Premiere Pro CS5 and CS 5.5 Cost: Free! Notes: Mostly text-based tutorials.

Lynda.com: Premiere Pro CS5 Essential Training Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: 5 hours of training videos on Premiere Pro.

Lynda.com: Premiere Pro CS 5.5 New Features Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: 27min of tutorials about new features in PP 5.5. You would want to watch this after the tutorials listed above.

Lynda.com: Encore CS 5 - Essential Training Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: 4hrs of tutorials on Adobe's DVD authoring application.

Lynda.com: Audition 3 Essential Training Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: 6.5 hrs on Adobe's audio editing application. Doesn't appear to be fully up-to-date for CS5.5 version of the application.

Lynda.com: After Effects (various) Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: Hours upon hours of tutorials for Adobe's acclaimed effects and post-production application. Newcomers should start with After Effects Apprentice, which is 14 hours over 7 lessons.

 

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Avid Media Composer

Avid: Avid Media Composer 5: Getting Started Cost: Free! Notes: 3 hours of tutorials from Avid to get you started on Media Composer.

Lynda.com: Avid Media Composer 5 - Essential Training Cost: $25/month gives you access to all Lynda.com training videos. Notes: Nearly 6 hours of tutorials on Avid. This appears to replicate some of the free training Avid provides, but at twice the length, one assumes it also goes into more depth.

Avid: Avid for FCP Users Cost: $50 Notes: DVD-based tutorial. Does not appear to be available online.

On Plex: National Film Board of Canada and Snag Films

I've been setting up a HTPC on a new MacMini. Nothing fancy, it's basically a MacMini running Plex, which (if you're not familiar with it) is a free media server application similar to XBMC and Boxee.

I used Plex about a year and a half ago, when it was in rougher stages. Today, it seems both more robust as an application and also offers more variety in terms of the content available.

In addition to stuff like Netflix, TED, and South Park, there are "channels" from Snag Films and the National Film Board of Canada, which has an amazing library of films online, including works by Michel Brault.

Vimeo's HD channel looks amazing, too -- it looks as good as any HD cable I've seen. So far there's no Mubi support. Hopefully soon.

You don't need Plex to watch these videos, of course. Click the image below to watch Pour la suite du monde (aka Of Whales, the Moon, and Men).

Of Whales, The Moon, and Men

Cinematography for Improvisation: Post-Panel Links

The Cinematography for Improvisation panel that I moderated was a blast -- and, while I felt like it was a success, the one hour we had to dig in flew by. I personally could have listened to Andrew Reed, Allison Bohl, and Justin Molotnikov talk shop for another couple of hours. There were easily 100 people in the crowd on a Monday afternoon and the feedback after the panel was very positive. Here are the links, as promised:

Justin Molotnikov

 

Crying With Laughter -- Justin showed clips from this film, which had its North American Premiere at SXSW.

Synchronicity Films is Claire Mundell and Justin Molotnikov's production company. For those of you that attended the panel, Claire sat near the front of the room and shared some thoughts from the audience.

Finally, the improv film webisodes from the Wickerman Music festival that Justin briefly mentioned can be found at www.wickerman.tv.

Allison Bohl

"Blessed Be, Honey Bee" -- This is the music video that we saw behind-the-scenes stills for, but which we didn't have a chance to screen during the panel. Allison directed and shot this video.

Allison's reel is also on Vimeo. The reel features, among other things, selected shots/scenes from "People of Earth" the feature that Allison showed a clip from on the panel.

I Always Do My Collars First - website for Allison's first documentary

Andrew Reed

Quiet City -- Andrew showed a clip from this film, which had its World Premiere at SXSW in 2007.

Cold Weather is the new film by Aaron Katz, shot by Andrew Reed. The trailer can be found here.

Paul Harrill (moderator)

Obviously, if you are here, you have found my blog. Information about my own work as a filmmaker can be found here.

Gina, An Actress, Age 29 on The Auteurs

For some time I've debated putting my short films online. My work is often quiet, has relaxed pacing, and it can be dialogue heavy. That, combined with the fact that some of my films are over 20 minutes probably makes at least some of my work not the best candidate for online viewing. I've been impressed, though, with what The Auteurs is doing with online video. Their catalog caters to cinephiles, and their site's design and interface encourages people to pay attention to the videos they're watching. So I'm happy to say that my short film Gina, An Actress, Age 29, was recently selected for the site. It's just gone "live", and the timing is fitting, as the film premiered around this time of year in 2001, at Sundance.

 

Click on the image to view Gina, An Actress, Age 29 on The Auteurs. 

For now, the film is free for the first 1000 viewers. Spread the word, tell your friends, and become a fan of it if you like.

One way or another, if you do watch it, I hope you enjoy it!

Second Skin online for free thru 8/13

I saw Pure West's Second Skin at SXSW 2008. It's now being made available by Snag Films for free through August 13. Here's what I thought when I first saw it:

Second Skin digs into the world of MMORPGs, and how these online games create new lives and identities — on both sides of the computer screen — for the people playing them. Not being a gamer, I wondered how much I would care about the film’s subject, especially in light of the fact that 90% of the audience I viewed it with seemed to be there to see a film about their lives. Happily, the film finds some dynamic people to follow and it does superb job of chronicling their lives, both on- and off-line. I suspect this will have a healthy life on DVD, and perhaps theatrically.

Watch Second Skin on Snag Films.

Sita Sings the Blues is out on DVD. How, I'm still not sure.

Sita Sings the Blues, the critically acclaimed animated feature film single-handedly made by Nina Paley, is being released on DVD today. For those that haven't been following the story, the film's use of uncleared, copyrighted musical compositions has restricted the film's release. Today, indieWire reports that "[t]hrough an intense study of copyright laws, Paley has realized the opportunity to allow other people to sell her work with her endorsement, and she can receive donations from these distributors."

But the author of the article does not mention the legal conclusions that Paley (and her lawyers) arrived at, nor does the article make any mention of the source for this information.

One website that is acknowledged is QuestionCopyright, which has a lengthy interview with Paley. The comments section that follows the interview is worth a read, too, as there's a lot of back-and-forth between commenters supporting Paley's attempts to produce "new work" (as copyright law is supposed to encourage) and several other others that argue that blame Paley for the situation at hand.

Unfortunately, I still don't have answers about how Paley and her lawyers have decided to release the film on DVD. Perhaps it's because they're also giving it away via torrent?

If you want to buy the DVD, it's available here.

UPDATE: See the comments for answers....

Inauguration Day

Watching televised coverage of the inauguration, instead of being there, is probably like watching Dick Clark on New Year's Eve instead of standing in Times Square. The difference, of course, is that today's party is so historic that you might actually want to tune in. With just a few hours until the main event, here's Lifehacker's Guide to Catching the Inauguration from Anywhere. After reading this, you'll be able to tell your grandkids, "I remember the day President Obama was elected... I watched it on something called an iPhone."

Election Day +4

Just wanted to drop this as a follow-up to my last post, which concerned Video The Vote. For me, the day began at 6am, when I walked to my polling place in Roanoke and stood in a 40 minute line to vote. The line was the result of an electronic voting machine that didn't work and some poll workers who were getting on the job training about how to use the machines. Needless to say, it wasn't reassuring. I had a Flip video camera and took some very rough footage from my spot in line of the problematic machine. Needless to say, this was an inauspicious start to the day.

Thankfully, things did improve. The lines to that polling place shrunk by 8am, and I remained "on call" for Video The Vote for most of the day. I did drive out to Cloverdale, Virginia to document a woman whose voter registration address change had been lost; she had to vote provisionally.

The real story of the day, though, was in Blacksburg, where students from Virginia Tech were having to wait for several hours at one polling place. I heard about this late in the day, and a few minutes after reading the story (oddly, on Huffington Post instead of via The Roanoke Times website or from friends), Video The Vote called me from NYC, asking me to document the situation. Ashley was already in Blacksburg, so she went to capture footage. She got some great stuff with her Flip camera (videos 1, 2, 3).

NOTE: My name, not Ashley's, is on the footage because I was the one that registered for Video the Vote.

When Ashley returned home, we spent the evening uploading her footage. Video The Vote's website was SLAMMED, so uploads took forever. The fact that we were hitting the "refresh" button on our browsers to see election results wasn't helping.

Pennsylvania was called for Obama around the time that we were close to done uploading all of our videos from the day. We knew what was coming, so we headed over to an Election Day party.

And the rest, as they say, is history. Literally.

Production Boards and EP Scheduling with Chris Cobb

Assistant Director Chris Cobb has two sets of tutorials up on Expert Village that are worth a look. The first is a tutorial on setting up a script production board. If you've never done a script breakdown, you'll want to check it out.

The other tutorial demonstrates how to use EP Scheduling, the industry standard software for film shoot scheduling. Granted, EP Scheduling is not cheap ($499 msrp), but film school students may have access to it or may be able to afford the academic version (around $145 online), hence the linkage.

Peter Broderick's "New World"

This was originally pub'd in indieWire and is getting some linkage, but I've got to link to it too, as it's an astute piece on old and new distribution. Some of it is common knowledge by this point, but it does feel more up to date than Mark Gill's "sky is falling" speech a while back. Why?

Mark’s keynote focused on the distributors, production companies, studio specialty divisions, and foreign sales companies that dominate independent film in the Old World. Mark has many years of experience in this world. He was President of Miramax Films, then head of Warner Independent, and is now CEO of the Film Department. He sees things from the perspective of a seasoned Old World executive.

I see things from the filmmaker’s perspective. For the past 11 years, I have been helping filmmakers maximize revenues, get their films seen as widely as possible, and launch or further their careers. From 1997 until 2002, I experienced the deteriorating state of the Old World of Distribution as head of IFC’s Next Wave Films. After the company closed, I discovered the New World of Distribution in its formative stages. A few directors had already gotten impressive results by splitting up their rights and selling DVDs directly from their websites.

Read Welcome to the New World of Distribution.

The Conversation... with Scott Kirsner

Though this website is a direct result of my belief that new technologies are reshaping filmmaking, as well as the relationships that filmmakers have with their audience, I rarely write about the intersections between cinema, the web, gaming, and business. One the reason I don't is because there's already someone that does that much better than I could. His name is Scott Kirsner. A journalist by trade, Kirsner is the author of "The Future of Web Video: Opportunities for Producers, Entrepreneurs, Media Companies and Advertisers", the editor of CinemaTech (his must-read blog) and a contributor to publications as diverse as has also contributed to Variety, Wired, Salon.com, and BusinessWeek, among others.

Recently, Kirsner announced a new event to be held this fall in Berkeley, called The Conversation.

The Conversation

 

Billed as "a gathering... intended to explore the new business and creative opportunities emerging in 2008," The Conversation is "targeted to media-makers and technologists who want to understand and help shape the future of the entertainment industry."

If the list of organizers and "conversation leaders" is any indication, The Conversation will be well worth sitting in on.

In anticipation of the event, Kirsner and I exchanged a couple of Q+A emails. I thought I'd share this (lowercase "c") conversation with you:

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Your journalism has covered motion pictures, new technologies, the internet, and the intersections of all of these overlapping worlds. But I've, at least, always thought of you as a journalist -- someone that reports, someone that analyzes. With The Conversation you're an instigator, a participant.

I'm really interested in innovation, and how new ideas get introduced to the world. It's fun to write about that, but it's also fun to bring together people whom I've met in my journalistic travels, and get them talking to each other -- in person. All kinds of cool sparks fly. That's what we aim to do with The Conversation. I'll be there to ask questions and instigate, sure, but I also expect that our participants will do a lot of that, too.

How did The Conversation got started (no pun intended)?

There were two dynamics, really, that led to its creation. One is that a lot of times at film festivals, the discussions about new technologies, new tools, and new business models wind up as a side-show to the main event, which is watching movies. We wanted to do something where mapping out the future and getting up to speed with what other creators are doing would be the central purpose. The second dynamic was that there used to be this great event that happened twice in Montreal, called Digimart. Lance Weiler, Peter Broderick, Tiffany Shlain and I all spoke at the second Digimart a few years ago. It was a great gathering... but it didn't continue after 2006, and we wanted to keep its spirit alive and take it to a new geography.

One of the things the website says is that The Conversation is "definitely not a conference." Why make the distinction?

Conferences, to me, are about listening passively. They're often sold out to sponsors, which means they don't serve the participants very well. They tend to feature the same old speakers delivering the same old PowerPoint presentations. We're trying to avoid all that, and simply host a high-energy conversation among people creating change in the entertainment industry.

If you could only ask one question to all the people that will be attending -- the presenters and the registered attendees -- what would it be?

How is your relationship with your audience changing? That's a topic I'm obsessed with right now -- I think that some of the biggest changes over the next 10 years in TV, film, video, and games are going to revolve around that relationship between creator and audience.

 

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The Conversation unfolds October 17-18 in Berkeley, California. Visit the website for more information and to register.

From Here to Awesome

For filmmakers it is the best of times and worst of times. The tools are more accessible but the market has become saturated....From Here to Awesome is an attempt to answer some of the largest issues facing filmmakers today - discovery, distribution and sustainability.

- From Here to Awesome festival co-founder Lance Weiler

From Here to Awesome is a "new" film festival -- both in the sense that it has just launched and in its aims and approach. I encourage all filmmakers using film festivals as a gateway to larger distribution efforts (theatrical, DVD release, etc) to check it out.

Billed as a discovery and distribution festival, FHTA has been dreamt up by three filmmakers with unassailable DIY credibility: Lance Weiler (Head Trauma, The Last Broadcast), Arin Crumley (Four-Eyed Monsters) and M dot Strange (We Are the Strange). Their ethos and aesthetic run through the festival, from the way that they plan to use existing web community portals (YouTube, MySpace, etc) to conduct the submission and selection process, to the festival's filmmaker-friendly guidelines (e.g., no entry fee, all rights remain with filmmakers, etc).

Submissions are open (as of yesterday); the deadline for submissions is March 7.

In all, it's an ambitious undertaking, one that seems to be nothing less than a reinvention of the film festival. Here's wishing them -- and the filmmakers that submit -- the best of luck.

Check it out for yourself.